some years ago, I got a //c 9” green monitor, which worked fine for a few months, but I missed the color games. My options were connected to a TV (impractical) and also tried a small LCD monitor without success, as new monitors are 16:9, much more elongated than the traditional 4:3. The best solution was to get a replacement color monitor of the same size. In many forums asked if I could adapt Color Classic Macintosh monitors, Sony televisions…
KansasFest 2015, the Apple II centric convention has been announced. Held each year in Kansas City, Missouri, KFest is the only remaining convention which is dedicated to the Apple II Computer. This years event will be held 14 to 19 July. More details about the registration are forthcoming. For more information, check the KansasFest website at: http://www.kansasfest.org
First impressions of Apple’s up and coming Photos app for OS-X Yosemite were just announced by a number of publications with Apple lifting it’s embargo for media outlets to publish first impressions and hands-on reviews. the final Photos product will be delivered to Mac users as part of a free software update this spring with the 10.10.3 release of Yosemite. Photos for OS X will be a significant improvement for users in the Apple ecosystem and will be a familiar experience for most Mac users. Power…
Steve Nickolas has posted a patch which fixes the Apple II game Cubit on the Laser 128 computer. Cubit was a 1980’s clone of the popular Arcade game Q-Bert and was long the bain of those users who purchased the Video Technology produced Laser 128 Computer. A single memory location jump was causing the game to stop mid-stream as explained by Steve below: My experience has been Cu-bit breaks on a Laser due to firmware incompatibilities because it jumps to…
Radio Shack, long considered a hackers dream has fallen on hard times as of late. They have struggled mightily to keep pace with the changing market and have finally bitten the bullet with the filing of Bankruptcy. During the 1980’s, Radio Shack was one of the main competitors for the home computing market along side Apple and Commodore. Their computers made headway into many schools and homes but failed to keep pace once they switched to IBM compatible systems in…
One might think Apple’s MacbookAir is an incredibly thin machine, and indeed it is. Well, 2015 is going to be the year Macbook Air even sees further dramatic change. The venerable MBA already thin and light will be slimming down further with radical new concepts on the horizon. For starters, Apple will do away with the internal fan. This will allow quiet operation just like a fanless iPad. Apple plans to jettison most of the ports on the current Macbook Air . The…
The Apple II Scans website (http://www.apple2scans.net) has posted two new AppleSource Newsletters/ AppleSource was an Apple dealer centric newsletter produced by Apple Computer Inc. The latest additions include the AppleSource 24 and the non-numbered AppleSource issues. You can download all of the available issues from the Apple II Scans AppleSource page at: http://www.apple2scans.net/magazines/applesource/
Apple released their latest update version of their Yosemite Mac OS X Operating system this week. 10.10.2 includes a number of enhancements and fixes, including : Resolves an issue that might cause Wi-Fi to disconnect Resolves an issue that might cause web pages to load slowly Fixes an issue that could cause Spotlight to load remote email content when this preference is disabled in Mail Improves audio and video sync when using Bluetooth headphones Adds the ability to browse iCloud…
Apple has released an update to iTunes for both Mac and Windows. Version 12.1 includes a new control widget which allows users to control which song is playing within the notification center. It also includes fixes which are meant to improve the ability of iOS devices to sync with the desktop. The widget allows users to control the song choice, see which song is playing or to buy new songs or albums from the App store. http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1614?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US
Gerard Putter has updated the Virtual II emulator. The latest update to version 7.5.2 includes the following fixes: Fixed an issue that could cause the virtual procesor to get stuck in an endless loop. The right arrow key did not work correctly when used for game control. This has been fixed. Virtual II is an Apple II emulator for Mac OS X and is $49.95 for the full version. You can download the shareware version or the update from the…
The WOZPAK Special Edition has been re-published as a hardcover book. The new book is still the same 352 pages of Apple II information, however, it now fits nicely on the collectors shelves. The WOZPAK Special Edition was produced by Bill Martens and Brian Wiser and released as a paperback book in time for KansasFest 2013. This is one book you won’t want to miss and the Hardcover is…
Gerard Putter has updated the Virtual II emulator for the Mac. Version 7.5 has been released with Version 7.5.1 hot on its heels to fix an issue in the 7.5 release. Included in the two releases are the following updates and fixes: 7.5 Support for two Mockingboard cards in one machine, in order to listen to max. 12 channels. Corrected an issue with double low resolution colors. Added an experimental feature: the super serial card emulation can now work with…
CURVED/labs, a German company has come up with a design for an Anniversary Mac which pays serious homage to the 1984 Mac 128. Using all of the advances of the past 30 years and the style of the current Apple computers, the Neue Mac designed by CURVED/labs is a hybrid of many items including an SD card slot replacing the floppy disk from the Mac128K. Sadly, this is just a design and no physical machine exists but the design is…
Back in 2012, I bought an Apple //c to mod it put a G4 inside. When I started cleaning it, I went online to do some drive alignment, chip reseating and general restoration. That’s when I stumbled upon Retr0bright. First I had some trouble finding xantam gum, so i settled for Arrowroot. Waited for a weekend and on a Saturday, I lay down all the parts on the sun for a full day. The parts were so yellow, that I…
According to data released on the App Store Distribution page of the Apple Developer Support site, adoption of Apple’s latest version of their iOS 8 is now at a 68% of all iOS devices. The site also says that 96% of the devices are using at least iOS 7 leaving just a miniscule 4% of devices using older iOS’s. It does not go into detail as to the device breakdown so it can only be assumed that the 96% is…
Cash away the old year passes as Cupertino has to be a happy place given the wild success of the iPhone 6. Only now are wait times reverting to normal after the most successful product launch in tech history. Apple is once again in ascendancy, Samsung and other rivals descending. The question is, what does iTim do to keep the momentum going, or will 2015 be a relative disappointment by comparison? Try iPhone 6s and 7, refreshes of Apple TV…
Paris, January 6th, 2015 – Brutal Deluxe Sofware releases Merlin 32 Merlin 32 is a multi-pass Cross Assembler running under Windows targeting 8-bit processors in the 6502 series (such as 6502 and 65c02) and the 16 bit 65c816 processor. It is compatible with Glen Bredon’s Merlin 16+ syntax, including support for Macros, Pre-processor, Logical Expressions, Conditional Operations, Variables, Loops, Local Labels… It can build fixed position object code or relocatable executables (OMF v2.1) as we can find on 16-bit APPLE…
Over the years of the computer revolution, we always knew one fact. 48K or 64K or RAM memory or Random Access Memory, was not ever exactly 48K or 64K. When we bought our computer, we always expected and knew that we would be limited in what of that memory we could actually use. The Disk Operating System would eat a good chunk as would the Basic Interpreter. But now in this day an age where those not educated in computer…
Virtual Apple II released an update to the Virtual Apple II database today. Version 1.28 of the database includes a number of new software packages as well as updates to items recently added including a manual for David Schmenk’s PLASMA based game, Rogue. For those users utilizing the database through their ActiveGS Apps or other mobile based applications, you can update the database automatically through the notification which will appear shortly on your display. All other users can check out…
David Greelish’s fine historically compendium, Classic Computing: The Complete Historically Brewed is now available online in a PDF Ebook. The book which was produced in 2013 contains all issues of the Historically Brewed magazine. You can download the book for free from the Classic Computing website at: http://www.classiccomputing.com/CC/HB_Book.html
